


this could be the end of everything

by basementhero



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mythology, Angst with a Happy Ending, Creative License with Norse Mythology, M/M, Snow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-21
Updated: 2017-02-21
Packaged: 2018-09-26 02:06:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9857069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/basementhero/pseuds/basementhero
Summary: The Norns remembered each cycle of time and would recount the tale if asked: Harry and Niall were not the first of their kind, nor was it the world’s first attempt at existence. Some cycles were short while other stretched on for tens or hundreds or thousands of millennia. It was always the same in the end, though, no matter how many intervening years it took to get there. Baldr always fell; the giants always attacked, and the realms of Yggdrasil—the world tree—were always plunged back into the void after Ragnarök, waiting for rebirth.But not everything was so set in stone; at least, it didn’t seem to be.(or: Niall and Harry are immortal deities, but even gods are subject to fate.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> many liberties were taken with Norse legends, especially those that are still being debated

 “In the beginning, there was Muspelheim.”

On the pages of the weathered book in his hands and in the shadows of his memories of years past, flames licked across a desolate landscape, threatening to consume all that dared cross into the realm of heat and light. A giant stood, fiery sword in hand, poised to strike down the heavens when the time came for such a battle.

“And, to the North, Niflheim.”

The page turned, and with it came a startlingly opposite image—vast expanses of ice shrouded in darkness, shapes rising from a dense mist. The wind would have cut straight through a body to its very core and froze the sluggishly beating heart within, had any body made the fatal mistake of venturing past the point of no return, where breath ceased and only the cold remained.

“In between them was Ginnungagap, a void where the heat of Muspelheim met the ice of Niflheim and created water and, eventually, life.”

Lava and glaciers collided, and in the oasis left behind stood a couple with clasped hands, bare to the elements and basking in the creation of the universe. Rather simplified, Harry knew, and missing a section on the birth of the giants and the Aesir and all the other races, but the Humans were always so self-centered in their stories. Perhaps they had a right to be, with fleeting lives, only just long enough to glimpse the surface of their own potential—just short enough to be amazed at the world, make a step towards that which they could sense was out there but not understand, and then fade away. Harry did not envy their transient nature, but he did admire their seemingly endless, enthusiastic journey, as species and as individuals, to know more. One could easily become jaded with a lifespan as interminable as his own.

Looking out at the sea of enraptured faces in front of him, it was very easy for Harry to meet their curiosity with a genuine grin.

Across the library, Niall leaned back against a bookcase and crossed his arms loosely over his chest, his face soft and fond as he watched Harry regale the children with an energetic tale. Harry was always so animated when he told stories, waving his hands about and exaggerating all of his expressions to make the children smile and laugh and stay engaged with his words. The children sat as close as they could get without all clambering into his lap, tilting forward unconsciously as if drawn in by some magnetic force. It was only Harry pulling them closer; even when they didn’t understand everything he told them, they were still enthralled by Harry’s saga of realms and gods and giants.

“Odin and Frigg,” Harry continued his journey through the complicated family trees of Asgard, “had a son called Baldr, who was the most beloved of all the gods. He was love and purity and peace, and anyone who saw him said he glowed with light.”

Harry looked over the heads of the children and met Niall’s eyes with a soft smile. Niall _did_ glow—a healthy illumination of his skin that radiated outward so pleasantly that Harry couldn’t fathom how the mortals failed to see it. When he was especially happy, Niall could have lit up an entire banquet hall, and his laughter would echo through even the harshest warrior’s exterior. It was hardly any wonder that the whole of the Nine Realms reveled in his presence.

“With them was Ullr, a skilled hunter who lived in a forest of yew, where the ground was nearly always covered in snow.”

The forest surrounding their cabin just outside the village was made up of spruce, fir, birch; regardless, Harry felt at home in sight of the trees, sat on the back porch on chilly nights re-stringing his bow to the sound of nature moving around him. He didn’t hunt as often any longer—content, as they were, with purchasing packaged meats and other assorted foods from the Humans’ market in town—but there was still very little as calming to Harry as lining up an arrow and letting it soar through crisp winter air. He could lie in wait for hours, listening to the soft crunch of movement through snow, to his prey approaching unknowingly—usually Niall, who, no matter how hard he tried, couldn’t sneak past Harry’s ambushes. The smaller man found himself constantly tackled to the ground with Harry’s fingers digging into his sides until neither of them could breathe from laughter. Then they’d stay there, in the snow under the barren branches of hibernating trees, and let the cold seep into their bones to remind them they were still alive.

“When Odin heard of poor Baldr’s fate, he rushed back to Asgard to tell his wife. Queen Frigg made everything in all the realms promise not to harm Baldr. The gods all had a laugh about it, throwing stones and sticks and weapons at Baldr and watching them all bounce away. But Frigg had neglected to ask the mistletoe for its promise, thinking it too innocuous to ever pose any threat to her son, and she made the mistake of letting word of this reach the Trickster’s ears.”

Harry’s eyes were far less emotive as he went on with the story. Niall tightened his arms minutely, pulled all of his limbs just a bit closer to his body, as if to make himself a smaller target. They both knew the ending, knew how Loki would guide Hodr’s hand, and the mistletoe—such a benign little plant—would strike Baldr down.

The Norns remembered each cycle of time and would recount the tale if asked: Harry and Niall were not the first of their kind, nor was it the world’s first attempt at existence. Some cycles were short while other stretched on for tens or hundreds or thousands of millennia. It was always the same in the end, though, no matter how many intervening years it took to get there. Baldr always fell; the giants always attacked, and the realms of Yggdrasil—the world tree—were always plunged back into the void after Ragnarök, waiting for rebirth.

But not everything was so set in stone; at least, it didn’t seem to be.

When Niall had stolen away on his father’s horse as a child and ventured to visit the Norns at the Well of Urd—wanting, as children do when told that there are beings who know the future, to have a chat about his destiny—there had never been a mention any mention of Harry. In fact, they’d mentioned a woman Niall was meant to marry, meant to have children with, meant to love presumably in the way he’d reserved for Harry when he was barely old enough to understand that love was even what he felt. From what Harry knew of his own story—no less curious as a child, but less inclined to seek out the answers to his fate—he was supposed to be the second husband of the giantess Skadi. By the time he’d gotten around to meeting her, he’d already been long bound in body and heart and soul to Niall.

Harry insisted that they should have had poetry written about them, ballads sung in their honor, for theirs was a far better love story than the likes of the oft-cited _Romeo and Juliet_ —surely enough, Harry reasoned, to warrant a tear-jerking film or at the very least a reference in an overplayed radio hit. Unfortunately, the Midgardians were unaware of the missed opportunities, the ancient Nordic peoples having been led to believe in what should have happened rather than what did. That _they_ happened despite the word of the Norns gave them hope, sometimes. Hope they didn’t want to share aloud for fear of cursing any infinitesimal chance there was in the universe for Ragnarök never coming to pass.

If there _were_ ways in which Ragnarök didn’t happen, paths that veered off course enough to stave off the ultimate destruction, Harry and Niall were occasionally persuaded to believe that maybe they’d found one in the warmth of each other’s arms, in the strong fluttering of their hearts even after so many centuries of time spent together. If they let themselves get lost in moments of quiet embraces and leisurely kisses, unaffected by the ticking of the clock, they could be tricked into presumptions of freedom.

There was no telling when their choices would again set them on the prescribed course of destiny, or, indeed, where exactly they diverged from it to begin with.

Harry had known of Niall before they met. Of course he had: Niall was a son of Odin, the Allfather, and, as such, all of the Aesir—all of the realms, in their own time and way—knew his name. He hadn’t been called Niall, then. Harry hadn’t been called Harry, either.

Niall— _Baldr_ —had been a golden ray of sunshine in the palace halls, the favorite son of Queen Frigg and much-loved by his older brothers, especially Thor. Harry, then known as Ullr, like all the other boys of Asgard, had begun training to be a warrior at a young age. There, on the training field, was where he first met the smallest prince.

Ullr was older by a century or two, had been taller and closer to manhood. He stood out from his peers by being naturally better at archery and tracking than they could have ever hoped to be even with extensive practice. Baldr, on the other hand, was more innocent, more childishly energetic than the other warriors-to-be—decent enough with standard weaponry, but far too kind-hearted to truly strike at any of his sparring partners. He’d preferred practicing with Thor, confident that his half-brother could protect himself; however, the choice was heavily weighted in Thor’s favor. Thor was significantly older and larger than Baldr, had absolutely no desire or intention to hurt the boy, but couldn’t really help it sometimes.

“Try harder,” Baldr had taunted Thor on a particular day under the mild autumn sun. He darted closer and jabbed his sword playfully towards the elder’s torso.

“Don’t antagonize me, little one,” Thor had said back jovially.

Baldr’s clothes had already been ripped open in several places where Thor’s blade had caught him before he could dart away. None of the cuts were serious, hardly any even dripped enough blood to show on his tunic, but they made it plainly obvious that the boy was one wrong move away from getting a sword to the stomach. Thor was relatively unscathed, bearing only a scrape on his forearm. He was holding back the full force of his blows and moving intentionally slower than he could have—than he would have, if he were not facing down his beloved brother—but it ultimately wasn’t enough.

When exhaustively questioned later by the queen, Thor hadn’t been able to fully explain what had happened. He knew that Baldr had definitely thrown his whole body into an attack, lunging forward as he swung his sword. Thor knew that he had fallen into a well-practiced defensive maneuver, and yet somehow he must have swiped his shield too forcefully, too wildly, to cover his vulnerable side, instead hurling the metal straight into the younger boy. Baldr had crumpled to the ground with his hands clutching at his knee—his knuckles a ghostly white until the blood under his fingers smeared across his skin as he could not keep still—and his jaw clenched shut to keep from shouting out in agony.

Ullr had been across the field, shooting arrows lazily at the distant targets set up for training far below his skill level, when the commotion of Thor’s shouting drew his attention. He’d sprinted over as soon as he recognized the prince, keeping his bow and the arrow he’d been lining up, in case it turned out that he was running to assist Thor against an enemy of Asgard. There was no enemy in sight, however: only Thor, raising his voice and his hands as he panicked, and Baldr, in the grass and clearly in pain due to the grisly wound on his leg.

Ullr had dropped his weapons and placed a hand on Thor’s chest to lightly shove him towards the palace.

“Find Eir,” he’d commanded. “We will follow.”

He could have been impaled on the spot for daring to order anything of Thor, but Ullr could see that the elder prince was not handling his stress well at all, and his frantic muttering was entirely useless for keeping Baldr calm or getting him to the healers. Besides, if fear should have inspired him to hold his tongue, the far greater threat of facing the queen would have loosened his tongue again to send Thor forward for help, respect for royal status be damned. No one would have been courageous enough to face Frigg’s wrath if her darling child was left crippled—for the Aesir, not being able to fight was a fate worse than death.

Perhaps having returned to some of his senses, Thor did as he was told and ran off to find Eir, the greatest of Asgard’s healers and Baldr’s best chance at avoiding serious disfigurement. Ullr then had knelt beside the young prince and touched his arm, trying to soothe him as best he could. Baldr had glanced up at him through tearful blue eyes; there had been a strength in his gaze as he tried valiantly to cover his fear and his pain, to mask any weaknesses from judging eyes. Ullr had felt terrible for the boy. His heart broke for him.

“I need to lift you,” he explained gently. “It will hurt, but I’ll be as careful as I can.”

Baldr could do nothing but close his eyes and brace himself. Ullr had positioned his limbs, got his arms at the boy’s back and legs, and cautiously stood up. He could feel Baldr shaking in his arms, but there was little he could do to make the walk more comfortable. It wasn’t a particularly long journey to the palace, though it had of course seemed much longer that day as Ullr tried to keep steady so as not to jostle Baldr’s knee. His steps were deliberate, his arms tensed, and his torso straightened. Near halfway to their destination, just as he could begin to make out the silhouettes of the guards near the golden entrance of the palace, Ullr had looked down at the younger boy and noticed the wet trails down his cheeks. When he’d realized he was being watched, Baldr had wiped his face hurriedly to hide the evidence of his emotional outbreak. His motion had been frantic, but practiced.

“You can cry,” Ullr had remarked quietly.

Baldr had sniffed and tried to reign in the betrayal of his eyes. “I am a warrior of Asgard,” he insisted.

Ullr would have shrugged had he not been carrying the prince. “You’re hurt.”

That had set off another treacherous stream of water dripping down Baldr’s face. Ullr grimaced at himself; he was uncomfortable in the role of care-giver, had not had many experiences in providing comfort. He had only ever known the stoic guise of a fighter, with all feelings tucked away behind force and strategy and quick movements. He felt, however, that he had to at the very least attempt to reassure the boy.

“Everyone gets…injured,” he reasoned awkwardly. “You just have to…er, stand up again. And keep going.”

There was no chance for Baldr to reply, as they had arrived at the palace and were immediately met by Thor and Eir—the latter a portrait of absolute composure while the former vibrated with nervous energy. Eir had taken the youngest prince from Ullr’s hold without a word and whisked him away to the healing rooms with Thor trailing behind her all the way.

Despite his training schedule and the questioning glances of everyone he passed, Ullr had made his way back to the palace near daily until the young prince was back on his feet. He’d told himself the visits would stop was he was assured of Baldr’s well-being, but the prince’s recovery did little to keep him away. The palace staff had been relieved, though they would never have admitted so, to have someone else around to occupy Baldr’s attention and handle his bouts of joyful energy. They spent centuries together—darting through the palace halls, lying in the grass outside, strolling through the markets in town, fantasizing about the other realms and what it might be like to traverse the Bifröst to visit them.

These were all stories that Harry couldn’t tell the Midgardian children listening excitedly to him. They weren’t in the records—not in the _Eddas_ , not in carvings or poems or oral traditions. As far as the Humans were concerned, whether they were scholars or otherwise, Ullr was a mysterious, skiing hunter about whom very little was known, and Baldr was a son of the Allfather, tragically slain. The Humans knew nothing of stolen hours in the royal stables, whispered jokes and stifled laughter over pompous feasts, kisses born from shy glances under the summer sun. Their myths spoke nothing about Harry and Niall. In that way, they were very much like the stories told to children of Asgard, full of prophecy and unedited by the true course of time.

Harry finished his narrative with the promise of life restarting anew, as was tradition. The children cheered and smiled at him, despite having heard not five minutes previously about the deaths of most of the characters they’d been told about. Harry enjoyed their innocent elation and their appreciation for good storytelling, and he could understand the lure of a happy ending and its power to obscure the morbid details leading up to it.

Waving off their pleas for an encore, Harry gathered his thoughts and stood from where he’d been sat, legs folded, on the library carpet. His left foot was tingling with the sensation of pins and needles, but he shook it out and extracted himself from the group of children and the approaching crowd of parents. He only had eyes for Niall, still stood at the back of the room with a canvas shopping bag at his feet.

“Heill, ást mín,” Harry murmured with a serene smile tugging up his lips. “Missed you.”

Niall rolled his eyes fondly and let Harry pull him forward by the hips until they were nearly indecently close together for a public place. “I was gone for ten minutes.”

It went without saying that those ten minutes could have been the last, that Harry might never have seen Niall again. There was a time, early on in their courtship, when Harry wouldn’t let Niall out of his sight for anything. He had followed the blond everywhere, constantly terrified that he would turn his back and the next second hear Niall’s corpse hit the floor. There was still lingering paranoia in the dark corners of Harry’s brain; he still hated watching Niall walk away from him and not knowing if he’d come back, but he knew that he would lose Niall’s trust and patience if he continued to be so smothering. Having Niall for any uncertain length of time was inarguably preferable to driving him away.

He had resolved, therefore, to make every single second important, every moment worth something, so that, when it was all taken away, there wouldn’t be so many regrets left behind to haunt him. A bit melodramatic, perhaps. Sentimental. Cheesy, as the modern Humans might have said. But nonetheless true.

Harry tilted his head and kissed Niall—not the passionate, messy sort of kiss that he might have gone with had they been alone, but rather a tender press of the lips that lasted just long enough to feel it.

“Candles?” he asked, smirking with pride at the way Niall unconsciously followed his lips as he pulled away.

Niall nodded and gestured at the shopping bag, as if his having it was proof enough that he’d made all of the purchased Harry requested. “Don’t know why we need more of them, to be honest. We could start a candle store in our sitting room.”

Harry offered no explanation for his candle fixation; he didn’t really have one, anyway, beyond that he liked candles and liked to have an assortment of them artfully arranged in their home. He appreciated the soft glow of firelight spread about the room after sunset, the way it chased away the cold of midwinter and soothed the sometimes frenzied tide of thoughts in his head. Niall wasn’t opposed, even when the hot wax dripped onto their furniture or the flames came a bit close to igniting the curtains—the value of romantic lighting aesthetic could never be lost on someone as hopelessly infatuated as Niall was. He just liked to tease Harry for his quirks, to remind the man that he noticed and was fond of them.

The sun had set long before Harry and Niall returned to the cabin, thanks to the far northern latitude of their little town. Rather than turn on the lights, Harry placed the new candles—which smelled of lavender, a recent favorite of his—amongst the clusters already established around the house. Most of their scents were vaguely floral, subtle enough that they mixed pleasantly when lit in tandem. Harry retrieved the matches from a side-table drawer and carefully lit the wicks of a selection of candles and then proceeded to build up a decent blaze in the fireplace to maximize the firelight available.

His task complete, Harry joined his lover in the kitchen, sidling up behind Niall and plastering himself to the shorter man’s back. He puckered his lips and touched them to Niall’s cheek, then rested his chin on the blond’s shoulder to watch him cook. Niall was content to lean into the warmth of Harry wrapped around him, relishing the stillness of the evening, quiet except for the low crackling of the fire and the sizzle of the pan on the stove.

“You keep lying to them,” Niall said after several minutes of silence and the gentle swaying of their bodies to whatever tune Harry had running through his brain.

Harry hummed questioningly.

“About your mum.”

Harry’s amused chuckle was muffled in Niall’s neck.

Niall tried to keep a stern expression, tried to keep firm so that Harry would take his complaint seriously, but it was exceedingly difficult considering the euphoric high he felt just at the simple feeling of Harry’s laughter on his skin.

“It’s not funny, Harry. They think you’re my nephew.”

“ _Step_ -nephew.” Harry felt Niall’s elbow connect with his stomach, but it did little to stop his sniggering.

“It’s creepy.”

“They’re just Midgardians, Niall. Half of what they know was learnt from drunken warriors on holiday.”

“More often than not you.”

“And your brothers.”

Niall sighed and shook his head with a weary resignation built upon a lifetime of dealing with the exploits of his family and his lover.

With a triumphant beam, Harry nuzzled his nose into the junction of Niall’s neck and shoulder like an excited puppy. He was rarely bothered by the contents of Midgardian tales, whether or not he knew the sources for the particularly persistent rumors. He never sought to correct them, played along and continued to misinform the Humans when it suited him: A fair part of the reason was because it bothered Niall, but most significant was the fact that, after hundreds of years, no one would have believed him if he suddenly switched to the truth. The mythology regarding their people had been so altered and distorted by the likes of Snorri Sturluson—one of Harry’s favorite Midgardians to have ever lived, purely for comedic value—that he didn’t see why it mattered anymore if he let a few children and scholars believe that his mother was Sif, Thor’s wife and Niall’s sister-in-law. The woman in question thought it was rather funny that people believed she had given birth to Harry, considering that they were nearly the same age.

Midgardian stories were just that— _stories_ , no more right or wrong than the tales of epic quests and bitter wars told to Harry and Niall when they were young children still clinging to their mothers’ skirts. That the stories of mortal men tried to tell what the Aesir would label history was of little importance to the spirit of the telling. Harry couldn’t begrudge them their fantasies.

Late in the year, as it was, night had no natural marker to distinguish the late hours from their equally dark precedents. Only the clock over the fireplace kept time, chiming away on the hours as Niall and Harry progressed through the domestic routine they had established together, an outsider’s rendering of Midgardian life. They generally avoided more emerging forms of modern technology in favor of older inventions they were gradually getting used to—books, newspaper, the occasional movie at the local theater. Small screens and the vast information highway of the internet were ignored for peaceful nights reading by the fire or conversing in hushed voices about whatever struck their fancy.

“You know I will always love you, right?” Harry murmured later, when their dishes were discarded to the sink and Niall was cuddled up with his head tucked under Harry’s chin, such that he could feel the deep rumble of the other man’s voice.

There was no need for Niall to ask for clarification. The future had been nagging at the backs of both of their minds the entire evening, as it always seemed to be in some capacity. Characteristic about the inevitable end was that it could never be truly brushed aside, never forgotten. Harry didn’t expect an answer to his question, and he didn’t get one. Niall buried himself further into the space between Harry’s body and the back of their sofa.

Instead of pushing forward with a topic that grieved them both, Harry chose instead to card his fingers through Niall’s fluffy hair and let the subject die off.

“We should make a trip to visit Idunn soon,” he commented idly as the flicker of firelight illuminated the stray gray hairs hidden amongst the mess of blond atop Niall’s head.

Idunn’s garden lay just inside the walls of Asgard, situated so that the horses from the palace stables were unlikely to wander over to graze on her plants, but still easily accessible to most of the realm. She often had visitors ambling beneath the leaves of her orchard. They all called for her apples when they felt the pull of time weakening their bones and carving out wrinkles on their skin.

Just before the winter solstice, Thor trampled through her flowerbeds, too headstrong to ever look down and watch where his feet landed. Idunn spared a moment of silent mourning for her pansies and forget-me-nots while he approached, with Mjolnir swaying at his hip, where she was sat under the oldest apple tree. Her basket-weaving was of course put on hold by his appearance; she rose to her feet and smiled welcomingly.

“Góðan morgin,” she offered as Thor stepped into the shade an arm’s length or two away from her.

“Góðan morgin,” he parroted back politely.

She knelt down to pluck a fallen apple off of the grass and held it out to him once she was again standing, and remarked, “You’re a bit early.”

There was no set amount of time the Aesir were meant to wait between journeys to the garden, but of course patterns had regardless emerged over the years. Some gods and goddesses were paranoid about even the slightest moment of vulnerability; others, like Thor, tended to be on a more relaxed side of the spectrum, waiting until they noticed significant signs of aging before bothering to stroll over for an apple. Only small tufts of Thor’s beard were graying as he reached out to accept his life-prolonging fruit; whereas usually at least half of his facial hair would have lost its warm brown color by the time he decided it was time to see Idunn again.

“I wanted to check on you,” he replied with a sympathetic smile. She could tell that he clearly meant to be comforting, but in execution he looked a bit too stiff—as if he were uncomfortable moving his own muscles and standing in his own skin. “I’ve been worried about you, after that nasty business with Thjazi.”

Idunn grimaced involuntarily at the memory of her brief kidnapping. Though her time in the giant’s grasp was over, his rotten teeth and bloodshot eyes still haunted her mind whenever she dared to sleep. It helped little, grateful as she was to have been saved, knowing that her rescuer was the very same man who had led her to capture.

She should have known better; that, she decided soon after she was returned to her garden. She should have known as soon as he approached her that there was something more to his visit. An innocent offer to show her some wild apples he’d found that were perhaps equal to or more potent than her own? There was no such innocence in his heart, no spirit of charity which could ever underlie his propositions. Loki was never to be trusted. No matter how sincere he sounded, he always had some sort of ulterior motive festering below his pretty words.

Thor was understandably ignorant to Idunn’s reflections, and instead pushed forward with the reason for his visit. “Has my brother been by recently?”

“No.” Idunn didn’t need to ask to which brother Thor was referring. All of Asgard knew that he worried over Baldr, that he thought the younger Aesir was recklessly endangering himself and throwing his life away.

“It must be nearing time for his visit, though.” Thor gestured with his fruit to emphasize his point.

She nodded, absently brushing away dead leaves that had managed to get caught on the skirt of her dress as she’d sat under the branches.

“When was the last time you saw him?” He continued to press the topic, relentless in a way that he normally reserved for battle.

“I brought apples to him and Ullr…” she trailed off, trying to remember what year it had been.

She remembered the bright lights of the city at night—she’d spent a few weeks with them in the Midgardians’ “London”—and the sound of horseless carriages and weaponless people bustling about. She could recall the fast pace of the Humans’ days, how they flocked from place to place and kept _moving_ until long after the sun had set. She had called herself “Perrie,” and _Niall_ and _Harry_ had shown her monuments of Midgardian inventiveness. There was music, the likes of which she had never heard before or since, played on strange instruments to enormous crowds of people who screamed their every feeling. She was brought through the dead of night to halls filled with Humans dancing far too provocatively for any sense of propriety as cultivated in Asgard, where hair could be the entire range of the Bifrost’s hues and small bits of metal were pierced through ears, mouths, noses, and all sorts of other strange places. There was quite a scandal in the halls of Asgard when she came back from her visit with violet hair and a silver ring through her nostril.

She’d loved the chaos of it, the freedom unique to a realm where a lifetime’s worth of adventure had to fit into just one century. Her memories were full of wonder and laughter and discovery, but she could not place a timeframe to them. It seemed simultaneously like it had been just the other day and a millennium ago.

“It must have been a while now. I can’t remember exactly when.” She smiled apologetically and shrugged her pale shoulders.

“Maybe I’d better take one to him.”

Idunn considered the idea for a moment, examining the man before her and searching his eyes. She wasn’t sure what, precisely, she was looking for—perhaps sincerity or some hint of an ulterior motive. But she was being foolish, she realized, questioning a prince of Asgard, and banished the odd hesitation from her mind with a tiny, physical shake of her head. She sorted out two more apples for him to take before he was on his way.

“Say hello to your brother and Ullr for me,” she called at his retreating back.

He waved a hand just above his shoulder to acknowledge her request, but Thor didn’t turn back or shout an affirmative. She’d honestly expected him to stay with her longer, perchance until closer to supper, chatting about his latest hunt and inquiring after her other plants. He usually liked to make friendly conversation when he visited, had said it was because he didn’t want her to feel as though he—and the other Aesir—were only coming to visit her for the fruit. She supposed, though, that he _was_ rather concerned for Baldr. She suspected that she would have had trouble conversing happily if she were similarly troubled.

Thor tromped towards the palace with his cape billowing out behind him. A testament to the might of the Aesir, the palace stood as an intimidating fortress in the Asgardian skyline, catching sunlight and glowing a rich gold that was more commonly seen in the Allfather’s treasure vaults. Odin himself sat in the castle on a high throne overlooking a lavishly decorated hall; there, he took council and made decisions for the realms. Upon his throne, he could examine the very fabric of the universe itself, or so he liked to tell anyone who doubted his power. Few dared to question an all-seeing man, even if he saw with only one eye. Frigg ruled at his side, softer in touch but no less fierce and loyal and powerful; her ability to understand and weave the threads of destiny rivaled the Norns. Asgard surely would have fallen without them; the palace would have been reduced to rubble and the city overtaken by giants long before the coming of Ragnarök, before the Aesir and the Jötnar were meant to engage in their ultimate, fatal struggle.

As he passed an ornate silver mirror, Thor paused to regard his reflection in the glass, turning his head from side to side. His quest had turned out to be a bit more challenging than he’d anticipated when he and his fellow warriors had set out—nothing Asgard’s finest couldn’t handle, of course. He had lost only an eyebrow to the beast, leaving his forehead looking rather uneven with it missing. He counted himself lucky that the flames hadn’t singed across his skin as well and damaged his face. Battle scars were nothing new to Thor; however, he preferred to keep his visage intact whenever possible.

He gently poked at his brow bone to test if it was at all painful, but was drawn out of his self-examination by the sound of delicate footsteps approaching from his left—the side of the hall that connected to the palace’s grand entrance.

Thor was shocked to see Idunn advancing toward him, dark cloak draped over her body, but it was a pleasant surprise. It was not often one saw the goddess outside of her gardens, the fact increasingly true following her capture on one of the rare occasions she had ventured away from her home. He was nonetheless glad to find her in the palace; she was just as brave and strong as he’d always known her to be, even in the face of justified fear.

“Idunn,” he welcomed her merrily. “I trust you are well?”

“As well as can be expected.” Her face twisted in the approximation of a smile, a far cry from the sunny grins that usually graced her features.

The ordeal with Thjazi must have affected her more than she’d initially let on, he deduced. His anger at Loki grew to night heights at the thought of the man’s carelessly selfish mistakes causing so much trauma to someone Thor considered a friend. It seemed that whenever Thor thought he could not be any more furious with the trickster, some new revelation came to light to prove him wrong. He’d sworn he meant Idunn no harm, always carrying the intent to rescue her, but if Loki had spared even one passing consideration for her safety and well-being, he wouldn’t have disguised himself in her form and allowed himself to be taken instead.

Thor coughed lightly and pulled himself back into the conversation. He relaxed his stance in a way that he hoped would exude serenity and a willingness to aide Idunn in whatever purpose had required her journey to the palace. “What brings you here?”

Idunn pushed her cloak aside to make her hands visible, and, in doing so, revealed that she had brought with her two of her golden apples.

“I’ve brought these for your brother. I thought perhaps you could take them to him and Ullr.”

Thor’s forehead creased at the mention of his brother. His mind was immediately engulfed with all of his worries that the younger man was not taking care of himself and certainly not making well-reasoned decisions. Thor loved Baldr and to some extent trusted Ullr—as one warrior to another—to protect them both should some calamity happen to befall them, yet he was ever hopeful that one day he could convince Baldr to return home to Asgard. Nothing could have pleased him more than having his brother returned to the palace, where he would be looked after properly.

“I will deliver them with haste,” Thor declared with all the righteousness that one should have when tasked with the very life force of his beloved brother.

Idunn’s small, almost awkward smile grew into a full-blown grin. She seemed manic upon first appearance, though Thor quickly shook the notion from his head and beamed back at her, radiating encouragement and approval.

The apples were thrust into his hands, and she continued down the hall with a skip in her step. Thor noted, with no shortage of amusement, that she was headed in the direction of the library Loki liked to lurk in when he was scheming. The prince chuckled to himself at the thought of Idunn gleefully waltzing into the room to put the trickster in his place with a much-deserved walloping.

Thor tossed one of the apples up into the air absentmindedly and caught it again as he contemplated whether or not the Allfather would be amenable to a brief search from his throne for Baldr’s newest Midgardian abode. Before he could make that decision, Thor’s attention was grabbed by the very faint glimmer of candlelight reflected on the skin of the fruit on its fall from the air. As he looked at it, the apple seemed atypically muted in color—not quite the golden sheen that was associated with Idunn’s usual harvest. He realized that he’d never seen one of them long off its branch and did not actually know if they rotted like normal apples. The fruit of long life could, conceivably, have had rather average lifespans themselves.

The Allfather would have to make time for his request, Thor decided, and made for the throne room. He would get the location of his brother and then head directly for the Bifröst.

He did hope that Baldr wasn’t out exploring Midgard again. It was always harder to track the younger Aesir down when he was adventuring. Thor didn’t understand the purpose of such expeditions, as they lacked defined goals and included neither glorious battle nor a vigorous hunt to deem the journey worthwhile and the journeyers victorious.

“I win,” Harry chimed with a boastful grin.

Niall glared at him. “Shush. You haven’t won yet.”

“Oh, haven’t I?” Harry leaned forward with his folded arms resting on the edge of the table. His dimples dug further into his cheeks the closer he got to Niall. “E7.”

“You missed.”

There was a split second of shock on Harry’s face before his smugness doubled in strength and he almost hovered off his seat with pleasure. “No I didn’t.”

Niall frowned, scrunching his face unhappily. “Fuck off.”

“Say it,” Harry taunted.

“You sunk my battleship, alright? Happy?”

“Yes.”

Harry stretched all the way across the table to kiss Niall’s pout away. Niall pulled away and poked his tongue out at his lover to show that he wasn’t _too_ sore of a loser.

“Winner cleans up,” he proclaimed before pushing himself away from the table and out of Harry’s reach.

Niall stood up from his chair and pointedly nudged his board in Harry’s direction. He then sauntered out of the room before Harry could get a word in against the hastily-created rule.

“We didn’t agree on that!” Harry shouted after him.

Niall popped his head back through the doorway with only a cheeky smile in response and popped back out again just as quickly.

Harry dutifully tidied up their game—pulled out the individual pegs, sorted them into the appropriate red and white receptacles, retrieved both halves of the game’s box—to the sound of Niall puttering about in the living room and humming Midgardian holiday carols. Niall was fond of the more modern pop hits, and Harry was partial to the more traditional hymns, so together they filled their house with a medley far more extensive than any two non-Christian, non-Human beings probably should have done.

“Loser makes tea?” Harry raised his voice just enough above his natural volume so that his question would be heard across the house.

Niall laughed like the twinkling music of the bells festively hung on tree branches and animals’ harnesses by yuletide revelers, not in sound quality or even tone, but in the way that the sound brightened Harry’s spirits. He was just visible in the entrance to the dining area again, on his way to start the kettle, when the both paused at the sound of a knock at the front door.

“Are we expecting someone?” Harry stood at his full height as if preparing for a fight.

Niall backed up and went toward the door instead. “I don’t think so.”

Harry was of half a mind to tell him to hide: That panicked half of his brain always reared up at the tiniest inkling of danger. It was a reflex that never seemed to weaken, no matter how much he tried to train himself to stay calm and rational until a threat was actually proven.

“Hell-”

Niall’s hesitant greeting was cut off by a pair of muscular arms immediately wrapping him in a crushing embrace. Harry started forward to help until he realized that he was hearing hearty laughter and familiar greetings, not Niall shouting for assistance. He approached the door at a more leisurely pace with a small smile already forming at the sight of Niall being smothered by his older brother.

“Put me down, Thor,” the blond complained half-heartedly, his protests betrayed by the way he hugged back rather tightly himself.

“Liam,” the bigger man stressed as he gently set Niall back on his feet. “I must blend in with the Midgardians, brother.”

For one seeking to blend in, Thor was abysmal at appearing anything other than foreign. He had not bothered to match Midgard’s standards of fashion at all, still donning the garments Humans had not worn since their Viking era, and even then, never with such embellishment as befit a son of Odin.

“Yes, there are so many here to suspect you of being a god.” Niall rolled his eyes playfully.

‘Liam’ appeared to miss the sarcasm, or at least to willfully ignore it. He allowed Niall to lead him fully into the cabin so that the door could be shut against the cold, winter air. Upon seeing Harry, he regarded the other man with suspicion.

“Have you been taking care of my brother?”

“Thor,” Niall groaned.

“ _Liam_.”

Harry answered earnestly, “Of course I have,” just as he had every other time he’d been accosted by Niall’s disapproving but well-meaning family.

Niall pushed at Harry’s shoulder, shoving him in the general direction of the back door. “Go cut some firewood,” he ordered, clearly trying to break up the two before a real interrogation could start. “Can’t let my brother freeze in our company.”

“Alright, ást mín.”

Harry pressed his lips to Niall’s and chased after the blond when he tried to separate them for modesty’s sake. Harry was not having that, instead softly moving his mouth against Niall’s for as long as it took before Liam finally made a disgusted noise. Only then did Harry let Niall get away, and he turned to smirk unapologetically at the brothers before he retreated outside to complete his task.

“ _Is_ he taking care of you?” Liam repeated, choosing generously to ignore what he’d just been made to witness. He fixed Niall with a stern frown that would banish the thought of lying, if there had been any.

Niall returned with a firm stare of his own. “I can look after myself.”

Liam’s expression melted into a remorseful smile, ruffling the blond’s hair good-naturedly, like he used to do when they were younger. “I know you can, little one.”

“I’m not little.” Niall swatted his brother’s hand away lightheartedly. “What happened to your eyebrow?”

Liam reached instinctively to his forehead, yet he grinned despite the injury. “It was a glorious battle, brother. We slew a ferocious dragon who was bothering a village in Vanaheim.”

“The mighty Thor? Lose an eyebrow to a mere dragon?” Niall teased.

“Já, brother, the creature breathed one fortuitous breath, but it was his last.”

Niall chuckled and recalled fondly the days of his childhood when he would listen to his brother’s stories and think going off on quests to slay menacing beasts was the height of living, the very best thing one could hope to do. He had no taste for battle any longer, if he ever had one to begin with. The same reverence with which his brother regarded a long, grueling fight, Niall found for Harry, for discovering an unforgettable music scene, for venturing to the ends of Midgard to see all of the realm’s secrets.

“I hope you ate before your trip. You get far too hungry after a hunt, and I won’t allow you to eat me out of house and home this time just because you forgot to stop for provisions.”

“On the contrary.” Liam pulled a leather satchel from his waist and, from it, produced two apples the color of the sunrise. “Idunn sent me with these, for you and Ul—Harry.”

“Thank you. You’ve saved us a trip.”

“Eat it.”

Liam insistently passed his brother the larger of the fruit. He could make out the early signs of aging on Niall’s face—extra crinkles at his eyes, discoloration in his hair, a hollowness to his cheeks—and would not allow the process to go on any longer, not since he’d arrived with the solution to the problem. He would never take risks with his brother’s life, not even a spare second. He would have made Niall eat both the apples, Harry be damned, if that was what it took. It wasn’t, of course, as only a few bites were necessary in all but the most dire of circumstances, but Liam was nonetheless prepared for that possibility if it arose.

“Why so urgent, _Liam_?” Niall chuckled. “Did you poison it? Trying to get rid of me?”

“Yes, so I can be Father’s favorite,” Liam sniggered.

Outside, Harry raised his axe and brought it down in a graceful arc to slice through another log. After the first two or three, his eyes had adjusted to the darkness—useful, since he had neglected to bring a lamp with him. He hadn’t brought his good snow boots either, or gloves with better grip to hold the wooden axe handle, which was close to frozen from sitting outside propped against the porch from the last time he’d come out for firewood. He was a god of winter, and so not particularly bothered by the cold or snow or ice, but he likely would have already finished the job if he’d thought to pick up the proper equipment on the way out. He could have been already back inside, hanging all over Niall in a way that toed the line between creating discomfort for Thor—or ‘Liam,’ whatever he was going by on this particular visit—and making Niall actually embarrassed. The former was one of Harry’s favorite pastimes, but the latter would have him sleeping on the sofa for a week if he wasn’t careful.

“ _Last Christmas, I gave you my heart_ ,” he sang under his breath without really realizing he was doing it. The tune was one of Niall’s seasonal favorites, a remnant of the days of ‘80s pop—the Midgardian genre that had captured Niall’s fixation in a way that no others ever could, even if Niall liked to pretend he was more of a ‘70s rock connoisseur. Harry himself liked to say he was appreciative of many eras and genres, even if the truth was that he’d always just been along for the ride. He would take in whatever Niall fell in love with and amass a much smaller personal collection of his own, mostly comprised of sounds and words and melodies that reminded him in some way of the man he’d followed more than willingly to an entirely new realm, away from the rest of their kind.

Harry fell into the rhythm of standing a log up on the tree stump in front of him, drawing back the axe, and chopping the log into two fairly even pieces. Log, axe, chop. Log, axe, chop. Log, axe, chop, shouting.

Harry paused mid-stretch for a new piece of wood and strained his ears.

The echoes of a distress call bounced through the trees. “Baldr!”

He abandoned his axe and the firewood and ran, sprinted faster than his legs could reasonably carry him without the boost of desperation. He couldn’t hear the sound of his footsteps snapping twigs or crunching through the snow over the deafening sound of his every heartbeat.

Harry vaulted over the porch, caught his foot on the railing but didn’t let the stumbling slow his momentum as he crashed through the back door.

The first thing he saw was the Battleship boards still sitting on the table, waiting to be put away. Both of their chairs were still pulled out at odd angles—Harry’s clearly shoved aside haphazardly and Niall’s merely pushed back enough for him to have slipped away. Harry dragged his eyes to the left, one hand still gripping the doorknob for dear life.

He could make out a figure hunched over on the other side of the sofa, cloaked in an anachronistic red cape.

“Baldr.” The figure shook with sobs. “This isn’t amusing. Your jest is too morbid to be humorous,” the voice wavered on every other word, hitching and choking with tears.

On the ground, sticking out past the sofa, were feet in familiar striped socks.

Harry tore across the room. Forced Liam away hard enough to send the man sprawling onto his back. Threw himself to the floor on his knees.

He ran his hands all over Niall’s body—helpless, hopeless. Grabbed at his shirt and his hands and his hair and his face and his waist and pinched him everywhere it hurt—everywhere it _should have_ hurt enough to make Niall shout at him and flinch away. Niall didn’t move. His chest didn’t rise and his lips didn’t part and his eyes didn’t flit back and forth under his eyelids like they would when he was sleeping beside Harry, safe and sound and not…

There was no rhythmic thumping under Niall’s skin when Harry rammed his ear against his chest and waited. There were no exhales falling from his mouth to blow a warm puff of air on Harry’s hand as he hovered it over his face.

The color was draining from Niall’s face—except for his lips, which were tinted blue underneath a stain of red blood. Harry tried to press the color back with his fingertips, as if his prodding could act like an artist dabbing paint onto a snow-white canvas. If anything, Niall went paler.

Harry froze as he gradually registered that Niall was dead. He wasn’t alive anymore. He was gone.

“Niall,” he wept, had been weeping the whole time and whimpering and crying in anguish as his tear ducts had already come to the correct conclusion before his brain could catch up.

A shuddering cough caught his attention. Harry snapped his head around fast enough to give himself whiplash.

Liam. _Thor_. Niall’s own _brother_. Had _killed him_.

Harry charged.

He lurched to his feet and launched himself at the other man, sending them both back stumbling into the wall. He punched, jabbed, flung his fists into any part of Thor that he could see with his raging tunnel vision. His knuckles bruised and broke skin on the unforgiving metal of the man’s armor, but Harry kept going, shouting incoherently, until he found himself wrapping his fingers around Thor’s throat, gripping tightly, hoping that if he could just channel all of his hurt and his wrath and his hysteria into that one action, he could squeeze the light from Thor’s eyes like Thor had ripped the light from Harry’s life.

Surprise and adrenaline could only buy him so much time.

Thor seized Harry’s hands and wrestled him to the ground. Harry had been out of warrior training too long—he’d grown used to only needing to kiss his way free from any tussles—so his struggles to toss Thor off him were no use.

“You killed him,” Harry raved. “You killed him, you fucking bastard!”

Thor pinned Harry’s wrists and looked him straight in the eyes. Their faces were mirror images of heartache, from the damp tear tracts on their cheeks to the dull, bloodshot eyes.

Harry broke eye contact first, turning his head away like a child throwing a tantrum. It didn’t help, as his gaze was drawn instead to Niall still on the floor not far away. He ignored Thor’s attempts to reason with him, tuned it out to white noise buzzing in his ears. Harry couldn’t stop staring at Niall, counting all the ways death had already taken its toll on a body he’d spent centuries holding close at night, waking up next to in the morning, watching walk away from him while he feared this very moment, the moment when he looked and there was no one there to look back.

At Niall’s side, so overshadowed by the crushing presence of a corpse nearby, lay a blackened apple with an exaggerated bite taken out of it. Harry zeroed in on its rotted form.

“You poisoned him,” he cut Thor off mid-sentence with his accusation, not that he’d been listening enough to realize or care.

“No, I—I would never.”

Harry glowered up at him murderously, his mouth tight and eyes hard.

Thor shook his head violently. “I received that apple directly from Idunn,” he argued, “and then I brought it straight here. I did not alter it with poison nor sorcery. I would swear this on my own life, Ullr. On the lives of my wife and children.”

Thor let Harry go and sat himself against the sofa tiredly. Harry crawled the small space to Niall and pulled the lifeless body into his arms. He cradled Niall’s head to his shoulder, made sure to bury Niall’s face in his neck like the other man would have done if he could have, and just held him there while he grieved.

The house was silent except for the dwindling fire and the whistling of the wind blowing inside from the open door, carrying with it the first hint of snowfall.

The snow followed them to Asgard, beginning to fall in earnest and coating the ground in white. The rivers hadn’t frozen yet when Harry and Thor presented Niall’s body—wrapped in Thor’s cape, but carried securely in Harry’s arms in a morbid parody of their first meeting—to the Allfather. Odin showed no emotion beyond resignation. Queen Frigg held herself together as well, but was not afraid to cry in her own dignified manner in front of the court as she brushed a stray lock of hair away from her son’s icy forehead.

Harry let them take Niall away from him. His arms fell numb immediately, and they fell to his sides to join the rest of his unfeeling body. He functioned only by necessity.

They questioned him, questioned Thor, questioned Idunn. Harry was barely responsive. He reacted only in outrage to the idea that he could have possibly killed Niall— _Niall_ , his lover, his partner in life, his _everything_. The unlucky guard who’d asked him such a preposterous question nearly found himself permanently injured. Harry fell back into his stupor soon after; he would answer their inquiries tonelessly, without truly hearing a single one of them.

It turned out to be an expert feat of deception, the series of events that sent Thor to Harry’s doorstep to take Niall away from him. No one was surprised when they worked it out: two different conversations, apples passing between the same hands twice, sudden changes in habit and personality. Loki had fooled them; he had tricked Idunn by disguising himself as Thor and Thor by being Idunn. He was just good enough at mimicry that their tiny suspicions weren’t enough to make them truly doubt what they thought had been their friend asking them for a favor. The news that Loki had seemingly disappeared was met with a matching lack of shock.

Harry could have old them who was at fault the minute his head had cleared from the initial blind fury, no interrogation needed. Loki was always going to murder Niall. He was always going to send someone to unsuspectingly do his work for him. He was always going to be a coward. It was foretold.

The funeral was planned quickly. Harry knew they only included him in the meetings with the royal family because Thor forced them to. Thor had decided on their somber journey to Asgard that his grief was best spent shared, specifically with Harry, and he would not have his brother’s lover removed from Niall’s final passage. Odin allowed it, but neither he nor the Queen were particularly welcoming of Harry’s presence.

Niall didn’t have a ship to be laid in for the ceremony, as he’d spent so little time with his own people after coming of age that he had never needed one. Harry could feel the incriminating glances thrown his way as Frigg relayed her sorrow that her son could not even have a proper farewell, sent off in his own ship. Thor slapped a heavy hand on Harry’s shoulder and announced that he would give up his own vessel for the funeral.

“My brother deserves a warrior’s ceremony,” he asserted. “My ship will carry him.”

No one argued. As far as Harry had heard, the Allfather hadn’t spoken more than a word at a time since hearing the news of his son’s death. Harry wished that he could have been similarly left in silence to mourn—left in absolute solitude, preferably, at home.

He hadn’t wanted to bring Niall back at all, and he wouldn’t have if it hadn’t been for Thor’s insistence. He’d wanted to chop down every tree in the forest beyond the cabin, if he’d had to, to build up a roaring flame. He would have told the night air about Niall for hours before he finally laid his lover to rest and let the fire consume what was left of him.

There wouldn’t have been music or feasts. There wouldn’t have been thousands of people who barely knew the man Niall had become. There would have been just Harry and Niall, the darkness and the fire.

The Queen had Niall dressed in fine robes that looked more foreign and unnatural on him than death did. The t-shirt and jeans he’d been wearing when he died were discarded like those clothes hadn’t been important to him. Harry wanted to laugh at himself when he nearly threw a fit over them—over a striped tee that Niall must have owned at least five of and a pair of blue skinny jeans that were indistinguishable from all the others in their closet at home. He picked up Niall’s clothes and folded them neatly, stacking them with his own Midgardian garments on an ancient wooden chair in the room they had given him for his stay. Sometime while he was sleeping, servants had crept in and laid out a more appropriate outfit for Harry to wear to the funeral. It was black and navy and dark gray, clearly made up of pieces borrowed from other people’s wardrobes or hastily made without his measurements: The tunic was slightly too loose for his frame, the trousers not long enough for his legs, and the boots too narrow for his feet. He hadn’t wanted to get out of bed at all, but the thought of leaving Niall alone to be manhandled and ogled yanked Harry out of his despondent cocoon of covers and furs.

Niall’s body was arranged solemnly in Thor’s gifted ship, his hands crossed delicately over his chest. Harry wasn’t allowed to lift him into the boat or smooth the wrinkles in his clothes; he wasn’t family in the literal sense. He had to watch Thor nearly drop Niall into the water because he was blubbering too intensely to keep a steady hold. They—the people of Asgard, strangers who hardly knew who they were mourning—showered their fallen prince in gold and jewels, all of which were immediately coated in a layer of snow, as the frozen showers would not pause for ritual grief.

When it was Harry’s turn to approach the waterside and look upon the body, he had to hold himself back from crawling into the boat with Niall and letting himself be burned, too.

“Goodbye,” he didn’t say aloud as he exhaled slowly and turned on his heel, returning to his place just at the front of the crowd.

“I’m sorry,” he held back as the strongest of the Aesir’s warriors pushed the ship fully into the water.

“I love you” didn’t make it past his lips as he pulled back the string of his bow. He lined up his shot, the tiny flame on the tip of his arrow wobbling as his fingers trembled for the first time since he was a child.

The arrow flew straight. It caught the ship where he intended it to and set it ablaze as it drifted out to sea.

Everyone watched from the shore as the flaming ship shrank on the horizon and took with it their final days of peace. Ragnarök was closing in.

After a dreary feast, the palace cleared slowly. People were reluctant to part from friends and comrades, experiencing, to a lesser extent, the same fear of almost certain future separation that Harry had been able to relate to just days before. He watched them all with a scowl. They knew nothing of the cruelty of anticipation. They knew nothing of the panic, the nightmares, the hopelessness. Harry wanted to crush the miniscule traces of optimism in their eyes; he wanted to remind them that they were all going to die in a battle with no victor, and it would all be meaningless, just the same as every turn of the narrative.

Niall would have reminded him that the time they had together was more important than the end, but, of course, Niall wasn’t around to do anything at all.

As Harry skulked back to his room, he noticed two figured just outside of the candlelight in the hall; they were obscured by shadow, but not so much so that Harry couldn’t recognize the extravagant mourning gown of the queen. She was speaking in urgent whispers with a servant which carried to Harry’s ears as only whistles of air. He knew what they were discussing without having to hear it: Hel. More specifically, the queen was demanding that the servant make the journey to the land of the dead to beg at the throne of Helheim for Niall’s return. Not once, never in all of the cycles that Harry had pestered the Norns into recounting for him, had Hel agreed to the proposition. She had always requested an impossible task, always ensured that she got to keep her newly acquired prize until the end of time. Queen Frigg had decided to try again anyway.

Harry left the two without letting his appearance be known and rushed to his room. He didn’t have many supplies with him, couldn’t secure much in the way of provisions without clueing the royal family in to his plans, wouldn’t have a lot of time to prepare if he wanted to maintain a head start, but he was determined. He wasn’t delusional: He didn’t dare to think that he could persuade Hel any better than all the souls who’d tried before. But Ragnarök was approaching swiftly, so Harry only had one chance, one window of opportunity before the countless days and nights of battle, in which to see Niall one last time. If nothing else, he needed one moment to say goodbye before time reset and it was as if Harry and Niall had never existed, never met, and certainly never fallen in love.

Thor hesitated in front of the door with his closed fist raised to rap his knuckles on the wood. It had seemed like a good idea just minutes previously, a kind gesture of comradery and shared loss. He’d dropped by the kitchens to retrieve a handful of plums—a fruit he fondly recalled eating after all of Asgard had retired to bed except for him and his brother, the both of them sprawled on the floor, laughing about the day’s events or stories they’d heard from the older warriors. Every time Thor returned from a hunt or quest while Baldr was still too young and inexperienced to join, he would bring back plums from the trees he’d pass on the way back to the palace. They’d share them while Thor recounted his adventure and Baldr complained of boredom or, as the years had gone on, rambled about a friend he’d made, someone who made him smile even when he was worried for his brother or his knee was aching with phantom pains again.

As he hovered outside Ullr’s room, Thor remembered with a small frown that the last time he’d sat and conversed properly with his brother over a midnight snack was the night Baldr had confided in Thor that he was leaving Asgard. The younger had joyously explained his plan to start a new life among the Humans of Midgard with that very friend he’d been infatuated with for a long while. At the time, Thor had been angry with Ullr, furious that he would conspire to corrupt Baldr and take him away from his home and family. In a way, he was still angry; he still believed, even if only in his wildest fantasies, that his brother would have lived if he’d stayed by Thor’s side and under his protection. There was no use for anger any longer, though, not when the Aesir needed to band together against the oncoming enemies.

Thor knocked on the door that separated him from the man that had replaced him—replaced the whole of Asgard—as his brother’s home.

Ullr didn’t answer. Thor knocked again and waited.

As the silence wore on, he began to grow worried that the other man had decided to do something desperate— _stupid_ , even—in the haze of his sorrow. Thor pushed open the door, forgoing permission, and called out for Ullr.

He still received no response. The room was empty.

Thor sighed and shook his head, but resolved not to alert the rest of the palace to Ullr’s departure. He noticed a folded stack of clothes left behind on the bed; he recognized the lined shirt and blue trousers, both of unfamiliar fabrics, as his brother’s garments. Thor rested the plums on top of the pile, left the memories behind to revisit another day, and retreated.

Several servants hurried past him in the corridors. Judging by their blue-tinged lips and snow-covered cloaks, they’d just come in from their final duties outside for the night. Thor spared a thought for Ullr, out in the storm, even though he must have known what he was walking out into. He’d certainly been warned of the prophesized Fimbulvinter—the long, brutal covering of the world in cold and snow and ice—setting in after Baldr’s passing and before the giants finally made their first attack.

The horse that Harry had appropriated from the royal stables neighed disgruntledly as Harry urged it faster in the blizzard-like conditions. He had some sympathy for the animal, but not enough to turn around and return to shelter. The poor weather conditions would only continue and worsen; there would never have been a better time to make the trek, even if Harry had had the time to schedule around trivial matters like storms. He didn’t expect the horse to carry him all the way to Niflheim, but he intended to get at least a day or two of riding out of it before he had to set it free and continue on foot.

He had only a single cloak and a fur blanket he’d taken from the bed to shield him from the icy winds, but they would have to be enough. He was primarily relying on his Asgardian blood and affinity for winter to protect him from the sub-zero temperatures. A tiny voice crooned in his head, saying he could just let himself freeze and join Niall for what was left of time: He ignored it. Niall would never have spoken to him again, never forgiven him for being so fatally defeatist. Harry would make it to Helheim still breathing, no matter how hard the storm fought to keep him away.

And the storm _was_ merciless. The winds only picked up and the temperature fell as the days wore on. He had to leave the horse behind on the second day, or what he assumed to be the second day, as he couldn’t accurately tell day from night with the sky covered in such dark clouds and masked by rapidly swirling snowfall. Harry slogged through dense, heavy snow that rose up to his knees; he longed for the skis he knew were stored just underneath his bed frame at the cabin. The muscles in his legs burned every time he had to pull his foot up to take the next step. His toes were beyond numb, as were his fingers, ears, nose, and eyelids. He’d wrapped the fur blanket around his shoulders, but he’d grown used to its warmth too quickly and it became just another layer weighing him down under a thick cover of frost.

He wasn’t entirely sure where he was going, if he was even walking—generous, as it was, to call what he was doing walking—in the right direction. There were no sun or stars to orient himself, no path to follow or distant landmark to aim for. He kept himself headed towards the worst of the storm, though the worst always seemed to grow more brutal every few moments. As Niflheim was the homeland of ice and frost, he reasoned that a blizzard of nightmarish proportions must have originated there: The storm, in all its hellishness, would guide him to the domain of Hel herself.

Figures appeared ahead of Harry as he dragged his body through the frozen sea, wading through droplets of ice and trying not to trip over roots and stones hidden in the invisible depths. He saw shadows dance in his path; their forms skipped forward without being affected by the snow that impeded him. He didn’t need light to know what they were— _who_ they were—because there was only one person that his dimming consciousness would conjure. Even without the sun shining on golden hair, without the ability to see the sparkle twinkling in bright blue eyes, Harry could make out Niall’s energetic, bouncing step. He would have smiled had he been able to move his lips. Perhaps he should have been worried about his sanity and despaired that hallucinations were not a good symptom to have, but the sight of Niall, even an illusion, would always be welcome.

Harry and his companion continued the journey like old friends on an afternoon stroll in the park, though one of them wasn’t really there and the other was experiencing hypothermia. Harry could imagine them somewhere different, replace the howling wind with the roar of an ocean or the commotion of a busy city square. He could think of conversations he and Niall had already worked through or those they never had the chance to start, and he would gaze at the phantom at his side and be content pretending he wasn’t alone.

It was Niall who stumbled across the river, yet he didn’t so much stumble upon it as stride apathetically onto it, like it wasn’t any different than the snow. Harry paused in his labored walking and tried to blink the frost from his eyelashes.

The river stood out from the storm over Harry’s head and from the other bodies of water he’d passed before the snow became so deep that land and sea all looked the same: The river wasn’t solid. It still flowed—sluggishly, painfully slowly, with chunks of ice at the surface floating unhurriedly downstream—without care or acknowledgement of the freezing temperature or the mountains of snow falling from the sky.

This was the river Gjöll. Harry could feel his determination, beaten down by the blizzard and the hours of misery in the cold, refortify itself at the sight. He didn’t even notice Niall vanish from his side.

He approached the bridge with surer steps than he’d been able to take in days. There was no time to ogle the structure or its impressive golden roof; Harry had no patience for observation when his goal was so close at hand.

“Who are you?” A voice called out as soon as he stepped off of frozen ground and onto the bridge.

The voice was smooth and low, gliding through the air like the ice in the water below Harry’s feet. In the sparse firelight of distant torches—with flames steady despite the violent winds—Harry spotted a shape near the far end of the bridge. It was wrapped in white furs, but even with the added mass was not exactly hulking in size. Harry moved towards it, towards the giantess that guarded the bridge between the realms of life and death.

“Who are you?” Modgud repeated emotionlessly.

Her face contradicted her steady voice. She furrowed her brow and stared at him like she was being confronted with a particularly difficult puzzle, the likes of which she was unfamiliar with. He supposed that her bemusement was well-founded, as who but the spirits of the deceased would try to walk into Hel?

“I am Ullr,” Harry declared with his most firm and godly register, though the name tasted foreign on his tongue.

Modgud approached with silent footsteps to better examine the man before her. Harry’s skin was colored nearly blue from the ceaseless whipping of the wind, but he still had a shine to him—the kind of luminescence that the giantess knew only came from life still affixed within a body.

“What business could the living have in the realm of the dead?”

“I’ve come for an audience with Hel,” he replied, but in his head was the truth: _for a moment to hold Niall again before the world ends._

As if she could see through to his brain, the giantess locked eyes with Harry, leveling him with a grave expression.

“The dead are of a different color than you and I, wanderer,” she cautioned. “The one you seek may have faded to no more than a specter.”

With her questions answered and her warning delivered, Modgud stepped aside to allow Harry to pass by. “You path is down and to the north.”

Harry left the bridge warily, his mind still processing the information he’d been given. He wasn’t sure if it was a riddle or the plain truth; he didn’t know whether or not he could really trust a giantess on the eve of Ragnarök. He knew with some certainty, however, that he was not about to turn back when he’d made it as far as he had—nearly to Hel’s doorstep. Modgud had let him through, so Harry pushed his apprehensions as far away as he could and brushed some of the snow from his shoulders before he was on his way.

While Fimbulvinter’s storm did seem to come from the harsh freeze of Niflheim, the blizzard did not touch the realm itself—rather, the fatal chill intensified at the border and swirled lividly at the edge of Midgard until it roared to life and became the storm that Harry was all too familiar with.

The homeland of ice was horrifying in its stillness: The only movement came from the eerie sway of mist at the tops of distant mountains. There was still very little in the way of light; at this point, Harry hadn’t seen the sun in a long time, hadn’t felt its comforting rays on his skin for over a week, needed to catch himself from the thought that maybe he’d only ever imagined such a thing in the first place. Without the sun, he had to guide himself by the pale cyan glow emanating from the ice. The barest of light reflected in the glaciers was just enough for Harry to make out his feet on the ground and the landscape just ahead of him.

He followed the road as best he could, though it fit only the loosest definition of what could be called a road. There was a rough approximation of a path—a space just large enough for one body to pass through, maybe two if huddled unbearably close together—left reasonably clear through the valleys and protrusions of ice that formed Niflheim. Harry treaded carefully on the slippery terrain; he did his best to keep his footsteps sure and solid, so that his heels didn’t slide out from underneath him and send him tumbling to the ground. The road let Harry along slow curves and sudden zig-zags, always winding back to point him towards a distant, lonely mountain.

As Harry came nearer, however, it became progressively clear that it wasn’t a mountain at all. It was a fortress.

With jagged spires jutting into the sky and a massive wall surrounding the barren grounds, the palace was surely fit for a queen of the dead. The gate was made up of two doors of translucent bars, each about the diameter of Harry’s arm; it was left open—invitingly, tauntingly open.

Harry was tempted, naturally. A simple jaunt through the front gate, effortless, appealed to him after such an arduous journey. He knew the legends, though, from years spent making a decent living detailing the wisdom of his people to the Midgardians: For whatever reason, all of Asgard knew not to walk through the gates of Helheim. One had to go over the wall itself or else suffer some terrible fate, one that was evidently worse than whatever might have necessitated one’s presence in Helheim in the first place. The suspicion had no basis that Harry was aware of, no supporting evidence to perpetrate its existence, and yet he still stepped off the path before he reached the gate and instead faced the wall.

The wall was a solid barrier of opaque ice; it’s only distinguishable feature from the plethora of other ice walls Harry had encountered on his way was that it stood intentionally apart from flatter ground, and it was somewhat noticeably shaped by purposeful hands rather than merely the forces of nature. It was just taller than Harry could reach with his fingertips, arms extended, as he stood at the bottom. The wall face wasn’t smooth or uniform like the ice sculptures Harry learned to carve on the frozen riverbanks in Midgardian winters. If Harry took a deep breath and swallowed his trepidation, he could use the uneven surface as footholds. He had to move quickly—that, he learned from his knees cracking painfully on solid ground—because his shoes were so caked with snow that they lacked the traction required to keep his feet on the minimal ledges available for climbing.

A running start—right—left—right—he felt his foot sliding, but he had his hands planted on the top of the wall well enough to lift himself up and over. His legs swung over the side clumsily, and the barrier was cleared. Harry fell to the ground on the other side. He’d tried to catch himself on his hands and knees, but, unfortunately, he collapsed in a heap after absorbing most of the impact with his left shoulder.

Harry lay there for a few moments, sucking in heaving breaths until the rush of falling wore out and he could pull himself slowly to his feet. His whole body ached, his shoulder most of all; he imagined it was probably turning a nasty shade of purple under his clothes. Regardless, he could still walk, so walk he did, curving his path back in line with the castle doors. He turned back for a moment to glance at the fence gates. Even from the other side, they seemed harmless and yet somehow sinister, enough to send a small shiver through his chest.

Hel’s fortress could only be accessed by a single, colossal door. The surface of it was covered in intricate fractals of frost, more detailed than it seemed was possible to occur by chance. Harry pushed at the door with his hands and then his uninjured shoulder, but it would not move an inch. He took a step back and regarded the doorway from top to bottom, finding no handle to turn or knocker to signal his arrival. Before he could begin to despair his awful luck, the door began to swing inward, dragging across the ground with an awful grinding noise. No one was on the other side to see Harry wince; the door had opened, as far as he could tell, by itself. Having no defense against the magical arts, Harry could do nothing but steel himself for any more surprises.

The grand entryway just inside the palace door had no furniture or decoration. The only things in the room were torches hung at intervals along the walls; they were lit with royal purple flame, but the area wasn’t cast in their bizarre hue, instead seeming as though the source of light was just an everyday fire. Harry followed them through the hall in front of him and down a wide corridor, passing no one and seeing no sign beyond the torches that anyone lived there.

At last, he reached what had to be the throne room. Empty except for two chairs on a raised platform, the throne room paled in comparison to that of Odin. The ruler of this realm was no less intimidating for it, sitting upon a high-backed chair of ice carved with runes and symbols Harry couldn’t make out from where he knelt beneath her scrutiny.

Hel was terribly beautiful, with a face designed straight from the desires of men and hair as black as ebony in rippling waves over her shoulders. Her eyes glowed the green of ash leaves in spring as she stared at her guest. Harry couldn’t help but stare at her, taking in the division of her body that left her right side the image of youthful perfection and her left in a state of decay, as dead as the souls she was tasked with housing in her realm. He wondered if her sight was at all limited, if her speech was affected by the muscles of the left side of her mouth being unable to articulate her words. He wondered if she staggered when she walked, if her stride was more of a lurch, if she had to take a step and then drag her other leg along. He wondered how she came to be half-dead on the throne of Hel, what it was that tied her to this desolate place.

His attention was not on her much longer than it took for the initial awestruck curiosity to flit through his mind.

Sitting beside the queen in a more modest throne—or perhaps it only looked modest in comparison to the radiance perched upon it—was the reason Harry had withstood sorrow and pain through the tempest to arrive where no other living being dared to go. Niall’s eyes were wide as he gaped at his battered lover, but beyond the incredulity, he could not hope to mask the relief in his gaze. Only fearful respect for Hel kept him from bolting down the stairs to Harry.

“The fearsome Ullr,” the queen purred with an uneven wicked grin, “come to join me before his time?”

Harry countered her with caution, “No, your majesty, I-”

“Baldr,” Hel addressed Niall without turning from Harry, “show our guest to his room. It’s far too late for what I’m sure will be an impassioned speech.”

With that, Harry was dismissed and his pleas put off until the queen deigned to hear them. He couldn’t spare more than one moment of irritation over that, not with Niall finally standing before him. The tide of emotions that washed over Harry all at once struck him dumb where he stood, unable to form words or pull his lover into an embrace. Niall understood, didn’t mind the quiet or the distance between them as he led Harry further into the palace to the room where he had spent his days hiding from Hel’s constant presence and waiting for Ragnarök to fully bring about his end.

As soon as they were fully inside the room, Niall could wait no longer. He flung his arms around Harry’s chest and pushed them as close together as they could be, breathing in the scent of his lover, whom he never thought he’d see again. Harry came to life in his embrace, wound his own arms around Niall, and pressed frantic kisses to the side of Niall’s head. The blond was cold to the touch and his skin a dull grayish color instead of the warm glow that Harry remembered, but he was tangibly there, with his grip real enough to make Harry aware of the injury to his shoulder. He welcomed the pain; it grounded him to a sense of reality he’d lost as soon as he’d seen Niall’s body on the cabin floor.

It seemed only natural to join their lips once more, to tug impatiently at each other’s clothing, to lie amongst the stark white furs piled upon a hard mattress of solid ice. Harry nearly couldn’t breathe in the frenzy of lips and skin and wandering hands; he was overwhelmed but neither able nor willing to stop.

“I’m dead,” Niall panted.

As if to prove it, his breath was invisible in the frigid air.

Harry ignored him, leaned in closer and attacked Niall’s neck with his mouth. “I love you.”

And it was enough. Enough that Niall felt almost warm as Harry pressed into him. Enough that Harry’s hands never faltered as they trailed over his sides and legs and hips even though Niall knew, underneath the haze of pleasure, that his skin must have felt like ice. Enough that Niall could recall the fading memory of his heart beating out of control, it stuttering and pounding to the rhythm of their bodies moving together. Enough that he could still tumble over the edge with Harry, their names tangling in the air like a promise fulfilled.

“I love you too,” Niall whispered into the heat of Harry’s sweaty chest instead of saying goodbye.

They slept peacefully through the artificial night, though the block of ice disagreed with Harry’s back and chilled him to the core and Niall had no need for sleep any longer. Being together allowed them to pretend they were simply in their bed at home with a fire dying on the hearth. If they awoke in the darkness, their tired eyes could mistake the walls for the deep red of painted wood, the furs for a thick patchwork quilt, and the low temperature for a window left open accidentally. If they felt as though they were not alone, it was merely the forest living around them and not the spirits of fallen men drifting about their final resting place.

The morning came too soon, signaled by an incremental brightening of the torchlight in lieu of the sunrise. Harry and Niall rose reluctantly from their entwined slumber and dressed each other like each were about to go off, alone, to their dooms. They shared one final kiss before leaving the bedroom: In the queen’s presence, they feared, outward signs of their love would not do them any favors.

Hel sat as though she had never left her throne room. Niall went to his seat beside her without having to be ordered there, and Harry again knelt at the base of the ascent to her royal feet. The image they created matched perfectly to the day previous, but Harry felt himself to be a changed man. He’d had his moment to say farewell and he did not accept it; he would have a thousand more moments before he gave in, on that he was resolved. And if he could not have a world in which he and Niall could live out the rest of their days together, he would settle for one in which no asinine war was allowed to erase their memory.

“You may present your impassioned speech now,” the queen announced.

Harry could tell that she found his plight amusing. She likely knew as well as he did that the bargain he was preparing to make always ended in her favor.

“I would ask for your goodwill.” Harry remained in genuflection, hoping that his willful subjugation would inspire her benevolence.

Her smile grew more sinister. “You ask much of me.”

“Only that you release Baldr’s spirit to Asgard, which would prevent the demise of both of our realms.”

“What would you give me in return?”

“Is the preservation of Yggdrasil not enough?”

Harry knew he was merely delaying the inevitable. Hel knew he was delaying the inevitable too, as she didn’t bother to answer his ridiculous question.

“If it is in my power to do so,” Harry conceded after a short silence, “I will give you whatever you desire in exchange for Baldr.”

“I should have proof,” Hel responded in a rehearsed manner. “Show me that every being in the Nine Realms weeps for your fallen prince.”

This was the condition Harry was supposed to agree to, but he was no fool.

“Loki sheds no tear over the man he killed, nor should you expect him to.”

“That is my offer.”

She challenged him to defy her with every facet of her stare, leaning forward just slightly and raising her eyebrows the smallest amount. No sane person would have met her gaze with obstinacy, yet Harry found himself in the position to do so. He was as clever as he was stubborn, and observant enough to recognize an opportunity when one came his way.

“It’s boring to do exactly as destiny commands,” he said with some confidence. “Surely you don’t answer to the whims of the Norns.”

Hel chuckled darkly. “Oh?”

Harry could see that he’d caught her attention, perhaps correctly played on a certain ennui that could only be felt by a queen who had little power to exact change on her own realm, much less the realms of the living.

“Allow Baldr to return to Asgard and stop Ragnarök, a feat which evidently has never been accomplished.”

“I cannot give away my most valuable prize for nothing in return.”

Harry carefully allowed his hair to fall forward and block his peripheral vision of Niall, watching the exchange nervously. “I will stay in his place.”

“Harry!” Niall shouted over the queen’s laughter.

Harry could not bear to meet Niall’s eyes. Seeing the anger on his lover’s face would not have forced Harry rescind his statement, but it would have made it all the more difficult to stand his ground against Hel. It was already difficult for him to remain so unyielding in the face of her cackling. 

“Your boldness is admirable, Asgardian,” Hel admitted. “I’m sure you would make a fetching reward, but a bit too willing for my tastes, I should think.”

There she paused, bringing the negotiation back under her absolute control as Harry could do nothing but wait for her judgement. He could only pray that she wanted to extend her authority over the path of the universe more than she wanted to put him in his place.

“Bring me the trickster, and I’ll give you your prince.”

Had it been anyone else, Harry might have paused to question whether he could or should bargain away another being’s life. He had no such qualms over Loki.

The queen granted him a steed for his return to Asgard—the skeleton of a horse that would gain flesh and blood as soon as he carried it out of Helheim. A better cloak she gave him also, to shield him from the storm, and a rope to bind Loki’s hands and his magic with them. Harry would deliver him to Hel, and he would be powerless to resist.

The flaw in Loki’s plan to have his crime carried out at a distance from himself, far enough away that he could slip into the shadows before his guilt was discovered—and it _would_ be discovered, there was no doubt in his mind—was that perhaps the Light Elves were not, as a whole, the most sympathetic when one was under persecution from the Aesir.

He had subtly changed his features and bade his hostess call him Zayn—a lovely little name he’d picked up once on Midgard and used every once in a while when he could not go by his own. She complied willingly, gracious and accommodating as she always was for him. He should have had her swear never to mention his presence at all, for just the news of a mysterious visitor in Alfheim was enough to arouse suspicions. When Odin decreed that it was the god of mischief who had orchestrated Baldr’s untimely demise, the Elves were quick to reveal him as the traitor.

They came for him at midday not much more than a fortnight after Baldr fell. Loki had some warning, but only just enough for a simple escape plan, rather than the more elaborate one he’d been planning. He was used to abandoning his grand schemes for effortless tricks he could execute swiftly and efficiently; it was tragic to be have his genius stifled so, but his continued freedom was more important than a lavish demonstration of skill.

The river that ran near his elven lover’s cabin was full of fish slithering through the fast-moving water. It would do for a hiding place until the Aesir moved on to look somewhere else. He transformed quickly into a plain salmon, the least eye-catching one of the bunch. Loki found it rather pleasant, swimming about in the cool waters, thought perhaps he could add a detour in his escape for a relaxing dip in the ocean somewhere.

Thor and his fellow warriors arrived at the house not long after Loki vanished from Odin’s sight. They tore the building apart, upending furniture and pulling up the floorboards to look for hidden doors. The Elf who lived there tried to dissuade them from destroying her home, but they paid no mind to a maiden who would lower herself to defend Loki.

The Aesir could see their prince’s anger rise the longer they were unsuccessful in their search. They had many times seen Thor’s rage taken out on creatures and warriors alike; none could stand long against him at his most livid. The Asgardian warriors knew they would not be able to calm him down were he to go on a rampage, and instead were more likely to get a hammer to the face for their troubles. They doubled their search effort: No speck of dust would go uninvestigated.

A seasoned fighter, old enough to remember with clarity the young Thor before he was gifted Mjolnir, sifted through the ashes in the fireplace. He considered idly the minute possibility that the elven maiden had grown tired of her lover and gotten rid of them in the fire before they’d arrived. The thought pleased him, though he knew it to be untrue. As much as it would have pleased him to hear that Loki had been slain by an Elf whom he’d trusted, it was pertinent that they recover the trickster for punishment at Odin’s hands. Just as the old warrior was about to move on to search a different area, ashes slipped from his fingers to reveal a bit of fishing net, still intact.

The presence of a burnt net meant next to nothing on its own: Perhaps the Elf had decided she didn’t care for fish any longer or had disposed of a torn net in the fire. Knowing that they were looking for the trickster, however, they had to take into consideration any clue they could find, even the most seemingly insignificant one, if they were to capture their target. Loki could have conceivably been in the middle of a fishing expedition when they arrived in the realm, been warned of the danger, and, knowing they would soon be upon him, flung his net into the fireplace to cover the evidence of his activities. Even if that were true, it still left the question of his current whereabouts.

“He may have returned to the river,” a younger warrior surmised, “for lack of better places to hide in this realm.”

Thor nodded and pointed his hammer at the man. “You, stay here, in case Loki should return. We will go to the river.”

Thor and his other warriors left the house and followed the worn path to a modest river. It flowed briskly downstream, carrying within its currents swarms of fish. They could not spot Loki along the riverbank, nor amongst the trees further away from the water. When it seemed that their search was futile, Thor caught sight of a fish swimming just a bit too far ahead of its group. It was unremarkable in all other ways, quite suspiciously so. Thor would not allow himself to be fooled again by Loki’s disguises, so it seemed to him that a fish so boring had to be designed to deflect attention. Loki, if he were truly the fish, had only failed to stay hidden amongst the others.

“Fetch me a net,” Thor commanded generally, assuming that someone would take the initiative to follow his order promptly.

Indeed, one warrior ran back towards the house and returned as quickly as his feet could carry him. Thor approached the river with careful footsteps and raised the net slowly, hoping to catch the fish by surprise. Thor struck in a practiced motion, scooping the fish from the water and moving it toward the land. It was a spirited creature, to be sure, and leapt out of the net, but Thor was faster and his grip was too forceful for the fish to escape again.

Loki was nothing if not pragmatic, and accepted his loss by abandoning his fish disguise. He allowed himself to be dressed and placed in shackles and followed the shoves to his back which urged him in the direction his captors intended, but he would not hold his tongue nor would he concede defeat.

They were taking him back to Asgard, where he would certainly be judged harshly for his crime. Odin was quite inventive with his punishments; Loki had to admit that even he was curious what sort of creative torture he would be subjected to for killing the favorite son. He could have his mouth sewn shut again, though repetition was not Odin’s style; there were many things the Allfather hadn’t tried which could make an appearance, like having his entrails devoured by birds or his body slowly burned while he was still conscious to feel every lick of the fire. Whatever Odin did to him, Loki would return tenfold when the Jötnar finally made their move on Asgard. The other Aesir would get their comeuppance, too, for their shouting and jeering at him as Thor dragged him through the street towards the Allfather’s palace.

“Gentle,” Loki—Zayn, by appearance, having not had time to return himself to his natural visage—complained towards the hand roughly grasping his bicep.

Thor was not amused by the request. Loki found it a shame that Thor could not admit how impressive it was that Loki had tricked not only him, but Idunn as well. Idunn was far more observant than the crown prince, yet even she, alert to the point of paranoia after their small misunderstanding, had not seen through his ruse. Odin, on his royal throne, with all his claims of omniscience, had not seen his deception. He had hoped that at least someone would appreciate the talent it took to craft such watertight disguises. Asgard was, instead, far too focused on poor, dead Baldr.

Well, Loki smirked as he was paraded towards the throne in chains, they would all be joining their beloved prince soon.

The king and queen both stared at their prisoner with nothing but absolute hatred when he and Thor approached. They would not be lenient, even after all Loki had done for Asgard—frequently before or after he’d placed the realm in turmoil, but, nonetheless, he had indisputably assisted the realm more in a decade than Baldr had in the centuries he was prancing about on Midgard.

“Loki,” the Allfather’s voiced boomed through the throne room. “You have slain a son of Odin, an heir to the throne of Asgard. Do you deny this charge?”

“No,” Loki replied flippantly.

“You shall be confined to spend the rest of your days in the dungeon, with no living soul to occupy your attention but a serpent, which-”

“Allfather!”

The entire realm seemed to turn in unison to the interruption at the entrance to the hall. Two figures came towards the proceedings: a horse that looked far past its better days and Ullr, his hair matted with ice.

“Where have you been?” Thor asked skeptically; he could not believe that the other man could have possibly returned from where he had surely been headed.

“I have been to see Hel, in her kingdom,” Harry explained. He looked imploringly at Odin. “Allfather, I would ask you to reconsider your sentence.”

“ _Hel_?” Frigg questioned, thinking of her servant, who had not made it two days in the blizzard before having no choice but to return to Asgard. “Did you see my son?”

“Yes, Niall— _Baldr_ was there, with her, and I struck a deal for his return.”

Odin raised his eyebrow. “What sort of deal?”

The hall was absolutely silent in anticipation of Harry’s answer. Many considered what they would have been willing to trade for the determent of Ragnarök.

“I am to bring the trickster to Helheim. In return, she will let Baldr go.”

An uproar rang out. Some cried for the immediate transfer of custody of the prisoner, more than happy to let Hel have him. Others refused the idea, insisted that the Allfather should extract Baldr’s worth in pain from the one who caused his death. Yet more were suspicious of Harry’s claims, seeing no honor or trustworthiness in one who could abandon his homeland to live amongst the mortals.

A loud banging killed off the clamor and drew attention back to Odin, who stopped hitting his spear against the floor only when every single one of the Aesir in his chamber had ceased their objections.

“If Hel wishes Loki in exchange for Prince Baldr…” Here, Odin paused to meet Harry’s eyes with an imposing look, waiting for confirmation.

“She does, Allfather. I swear it on my life.”

“Then Loki she shall have.”

No one dared protest further.

Harry found himself expeditiously in possession of a large sack of provisions, another horse—Sleipnir, the Allfather’s eight-legged steed, and the god of mischief. Astride Sleipnir, he could expect to be returned to Helheim in no more than a few days, even with the storm of Fimbulvinter still raging across most of the realms. He trusted the enchanted bindings Hel had gifted him with to keep Loki from being able to flee; however, he was less confident in his own ability to tolerate his lover’s killer for the duration of the journey. Loki was to be delivered alive and in working condition.

“Did you bed your boyfriend when you visited him in the grave?” Loki sneered from his spot at the back of Odin’s beast. “That _is_ what the mortals call their play things, is it not? Boy-friend?”

“It’s none of your business,” Harry huffed, gritting his teeth.

“I should think that you’d prefer a live body to defile, but I suppose a traitor to Asgard can’t be expected to have such high standards.”

Harry gripped the reigns tighter and adamantly kept his eyes forward and his foot from kicking backward just enough to connect with Loki’s shin.

However rigid he kept himself physically, Harry could not stop his mouth from snapping back, “I’m the traitor? I ride free, in command of the Allfather’s own horse, which he gave to me willingly. While you _murdered_ the Allfather’s son and are now just a bargaining chip for Hel’s favor. _You’re_ the traitor.”

Loki fell silent for a period of time, but Harry did not delude himself into thinking the argument was over. Loki’s best weapon had always been his tongue; his pride would never let him be bested in a duel of words, especially not when he was already at a physical disadvantage.

The next phase of battle came when they were camped for what Harry had decided, in the absence of a natural day cycle, would serve as the night. He found them a clearing amongst the forest they were riding through and laid one of the many blankets Queen Frigg had pushed into his hands over the snow under a sizable tree. Sleipnir he left untethered, trusting the training of the king’s horse to keep it from wandering, but Loki was tied to a low-hanging branch with a complex series of knots he would not have been able to untie before Harry’s attuned senses alerted him to the attempted escape. They each had some of the packed food, warmed only slightly by their breaths, and leaned against the tree trunk for a fitful rest.

Before Harry could fall asleep, Loki struck.

“You led Baldr away from the Allfather’s protection. You’re as responsible for his death as I am.”

Harry refused to open his eyes and grant Loki the satisfaction of seeing the emotion in his expression. “You would have killed him regardless.”

“You can’t be certain.”

“I can. All you’ve ever done is conform to the Norns’ prophecies.”

Loki glared at Harry furiously enough that, even without seeing it, Harry could feel the fire behind his gaze. “What makes you think you and your little prince are any different than the rest of the realms?”

“We chose-”

“You _chose_? Who granted you the authority to decide fate?”

Harry chose not to respond. His only answer was himself, that he made his own decision to control the destiny that awaited him. It wasn’t fate, per se—rather the lack of it, of any guiding force that knew his future before he reached it. He couldn’t find it within himself to genuinely trust in a plan foretold before he was born when it had been so demonstrably wrong. The Norns’ decrees had still made their way back onto his path, but only through the compliance of people like Loki, who seemed to find absolution from guilt in claiming that they had no choice but to become whatever the fates proclaimed, even if that meant being a murderer.

Some hours later, Harry finally gave up on his sporadic unconsciousness and roused Loki from his less-troubled sleep. They again mounted Sleipnir, Harry at the reigns and Loki as far back as he could sit without falling off.

As much as Harry enjoyed the respite from Loki’s pointed questions, the quiet did little for his frayed nerves. He expected an infuriating comment to be spat at his back any moment, and preparing himself for the blow was not at all helpful to the task of keeping Loki alive until they reached Helheim.

“Niall and I spent a lot of time with the Vikings when we first left Asgard. It was easier to immerse ourselves with the Humans that the Asgardians had been visiting on holiday for long enough that they began to worship us. We went by different names, moved from group to group. Niall wasn’t fond of the raids those people became famous for, but we could hardly stay around and not go along with them in their ships.”

Harry waited for Loki to chime in with a disparaging remark, but he received none.

“That’s how we got to Ireland. Niall loved it there, so…we stayed. A lot longer than we meant to, I think. He picked up the language quickly and tried to talk to the elders, wanting to get them to tell him their stories. They didn’t like him much because we were outsiders, and, of course, they had just been invaded.”

“Pathetic mortals. It’s a wonder they’ve not killed themselves off by now with their idiotic fighting.”

Harry let the comment pass, thinking that perhaps there was some wisdom to be found in it. He had himself noticed that the Midgardians’ penchant for killing each other was stifling their growth as a realm. He, however, noted that it was not as if the Aesir were so much more virtuous in their own past.

“He did hear this tale of an ancient king called Niall of the Nine Hostages. I think he fell in love with it because the king Niall began life as the youngest son of a king and proved himself better than all of his brothers, which amused him considering his family. He chose to name himself after the legend. I picked the name Harry after we moved across the sea to England, once it was starting to look suspicious that we hadn’t aged much.”

“Why are you telling me this incredibly boring history?”

Harry looked over his shoulder at his captive, who was thoroughly unimpressed. Harry shrugged and faced forward again, privately quite pleased that his storytelling was serving a dual purpose. Not only was he calming himself with thoughts of Niall, but he was also irritating the man he hated most in the world.

“Niall was always better than I was at learning to speak with the locals. By the time I sounded like the people around us, we would move somewhere else. Usually we would spend a few years in a new place and then come back to what the Midgardians call Scandinavia.”

Harry continued to speak, his words falling in a sort of natural rhythm with the gait of Sleipnir’s trot in the snow. He explained their occasional visits to Idunn or Thor, how he especially felt more comfortable in the Vikings’ old territories because he could grasp the languages without so much of a struggle. He did his best to paint a picture with his words of the landscapes they’d found on their journeys, from mountains to desert to the most immeasurable seashore he could ever imagine. Harry tried to mention Niall as much as possible because he sensed by the increase in scoffing that it bothered Loki more than just Harry’s ramblings about the rapid development of Human culture.

He was in the middle of a passionate retelling of a Hans Christian Andersen tale that he and Niall had had the fortune of being in the right place at the right time to hear read aloud by the man himself when the bridge to Niflheim came into view just ahead of them. Harry could feel Loki stiffen behind them, obviously recognizing what he was looking at. Harry dismounted and waited for Loki to do the same, as they could not ride the horse under the roof of the bridge.

“You have returned,” the giantess said by way of a greeting.

“I’ve brought Loki.”

“I see.”

Modgud did not address her newest visitor, nor did she say anything further. Harry led Sleipnir and Loki across the bridge without trouble.

The passage through Niflheim was not accompanied by any more of Harry’s memories. He had many more available to tell, inexhaustible as his memory was when it came to Niall, yet the towering blocks of ice discouraged him from breaking their silence with his recollections. Loki kept muted as well, though Harry assumed he was finally hit with the reality of his situation. There was no telling what Hel would do with him, but Loki had an eternity to find out. Harry pushed the thought from his mind.

Sleipnir was not inconvenienced by the fortress wall and jumped over it after a brief running start. Harry felt a momentary tug at the back of his tunic—Loki, trying to stay on the horse, desperate enough to use Harry for assistance—and then they were again safely on the ground. The castle door opened without hesitation at their approach. Harry dismounted, choosing to walk beside Sleipnir’s head through the halls; he almost thought he could feel the energy in the air moving around them, the dead floating about the castle in an endless, but unseen existence. Harry shuddered to think of his Niall becoming one of them.

Hel stood from her throne as they entered the room; Niall did as well, but his ascent was less dignified, driven primarily by the worry that had been plaguing him since Harry had gone: the fear that Harry would be hurt, that Hel would go back on her bargain, that Harry wouldn’t come back for him. Unlike Harry’s first visit to the realm of the dead, Niall didn’t bother to stay at his chair; he rushed immediately to Harry and kissed him with all of the life left inside him.

“I must say, I’m impressed,” Hel descended the stairs unhurriedly. “How did you persuade Odin to give me his catch?”

Harry removed his lips from Niall’s reluctantly, kept their foreheads touching while he caught his breath. He looked at the queen with Niall’s face still cradled in his hands, and could not feel contrite for revealing his affections in her presence.

“The Allfather’s priority is Baldr’s return.”

“I can’t imagine he’ll be seeing his son anytime soon.” Hel looked pointedly at Niall’s hands on Harry’s waist, but she was amused rather than disapproving. She had cared little for Odin’s satisfaction to begin with, and less so now that her reward was delivered.

Loki slid off Sleipnir’s back and landed in front of the queen, who watched him neutrally. He could not make out her plans from her face, and it unsettled him.

“I would offer you accommodation for the night,” Hel addressed the couple, “but I’m sure we all would prefer if you made your way back to wherever it is you hide from the Allfather’s rule.”

No one could disagree, except maybe Loki, whose uncertain future was only delayed by the presence of Harry and Niall in the queen’s throne room.

Harry assisted Niall onto Sleipnir’s back—unnecessarily, to be certain, but he found it difficult to stop touching Niall longer than a moment at a time. He climbed on himself, wrapped his arms around Niall to keep hold of the reigns, and sent one last passing glance with just a hint of pity towards Loki.

“I cannot truthfully say I look forward to your return,” Hel laughed, “but perhaps you’ll enjoy the golden pillars of Valhalla instead.”

Harry held Niall a bit closer to him and nodded politely. Sleipnir took that as his cue to leave the palace at a gallop; his many hooves clacked against the floor loud enough to wake any slumbering spirits there may have been hidden within the halls.

Outside, beyond the border of Niflheim, the storm had stilled to a light flurry of only occasional snowflakes. Harry could see the sun beginning to peek out from behind thinner clouds; he grinned into the back of Niall’s head, hugging the blond tightly.

Niall, not having experienced the desolation of the storm, was understandably perplexed. “What?”

“I haven’t seen the sun since you left.”

Niall craned his neck to see Harry’s face and the sheer delight to be found in his smile. Harry only smiled wider at the healthy pallor of Niall’s skin, the light returned to his eyes, the beat of his heart and the sight of his breath, too warm compared to the space around them, puffing out like white smoke. If there had been any chance for their return to Asgard, it disappeared from Harry’s mind without at a trace.

“How does Ireland sound?”

Niall hummed in contemplation, leaning back against Harry’s chest. He watched the scenery pass by, running his fingers through Sleipnir’s mane: Everything was covered in white, features indistinguishable, but for Niall it was a welcome sight to see anything but the walls of Hel’s palace.

“Let’s go home,” he decided—home being the little cabin in the woods where he took his last breath, where he had more important memories than a poisoned apple.

Harry pictured the house, Niall’s body on the floor; he wanted to shrink away from it, but how could he?

Sleipnir took them as far as their forest before the horse whinnied and stomped its feet until they got the message that they were to go the rest of the way on foot and allow him to return to the Allfather. Niall patted the horse’s neck like he used to when he was a child and let him go.

They held hands for balance in the snow and to ground each other to the knowledge that they were both alive and well and together and would go on that way for many more years to come. They made it through the forest unscathed, although Harry nearly fell over in fright at a fox darting across his field of view. The cabin sat just as buried as everything around it, still standing despite the weight of the snow on the roof and the force the wind must have exerted on the old walls. Together, they dug away enough snow and ice to clear the front door, where the mat under their feet read “Welcome” and they tried to feel that way.

Harry was the first inside. He tried to flick on the lights, but the power had been knocked out by the storm.

“Get the matches,” Niall suggested from behind him, making his way into the cabin after some hesitation.

Harry walked through the living room without looking at the floor to rummage through a kitchen drawer until his fingers grasped the matchbox. He and Niall began lighting clusters of candles, slowly bringing more of the house into view until they had no more wicks left unlit.

The spot on the floor where Harry had cried over Niall’s body for hours demanded Harry’s focus. He could feel the grief resurging within him, the absolute devastation and the fury. Niall reached over and grabbed Harry’s hand; he wove their fingers together and held on desperately. Where Harry saw misery, Niall saw only the darkness that had overtaken him before he had woken up as Hel’s trophy, with no means of escape. It was easier to move on, standing there side-by-side, with the feeling of each other’s clammy palms to wipe away the panic—not forget, if that would ever be possible, but to see the floor as just a wooden floor that they had walked over hundreds of times before, danced across to the sound of the radio, made love on when they were feeling impatient and weren’t thinking of their aching joints in the morning.

It was a mutual decision to leave the floor behind for a while. Neither knew who started moving first, but as one they retired to their bedroom. The blankets were all freezing for lack of use, and did not warm as quickly as they might have liked. Niall pressed his face into the back of Harry’s neck and wrapped his arms around the taller man’s torso while Harry rubbed circles with his thumb on Niall’s hand. They couldn’t fall asleep, but neither did they start talking.

Out of the window across from him, Harry watched the clouds clear and the sun slowly rise in the east. He was struck by the fleeting thought that perhaps they shouldn’t leave candles burning unsupervised for so long.

“What are you thinking about?” Niall whispered, unwilling to disturb the atmosphere.

“Hmm?”

“You shook your head.”

“Oh…was thinking we shouldn’t leave so many candles on their own.”

“They’re fine.” Niall burrowed further under the covers. “They can help thaw out the house.”

“I can go light a fireplace, if you’re cold.”

“No. Just stay here.” The “with me” went unspoken, but Harry heard it all the same.

Their whole morning was wasted in bed, the first of many more to come.


End file.
